Boras was calling to say that Damon had been placed on waivers by the Detroit Tigers, which certainly wasn’t a surprise giving their standing.

The real surprise: the club that had claimed him was the Red Sox, for whom he played from 2002-05. Damon, of course, was a key cog in the Idiot Culture that helped bring a World Series to Boston for the first time in 86 years.

The Red Sox, beset with injuries to their top-line outfielders, are looking to Damon for some help down the stretch. He’s batting .270 with a .355 OBP. Heading into Monday’s game with Seattle, the Sox outfielders were batting a collective .246, the worst in the AL, and their OBP of .309 was next to last.

The added benefit of obtaining Damon for the rest of the season would be the ability to pick up a draft pick next summer, assuming Damon does not return.

The hitch is that the Red Sox, who were beating the Mariners, 6-3, are one of the teams on Damon’s no-trade list. “I thought that ship had sailed,” he told reporters in Detroit. The Tigers are allowed to trade him to eight teams, but the Red Sox are not among them.

Damon has 48 hours to decide if he’ll accept a trade – and a trade has to be worked out.

“I have to think long and hard about this,” Damon said. “I hadn’t even thought about playing for that team again. Never crossed my mind.”

Damon left the Red Sox after the 2005 season, forever invoking the wrath of fans when he opted not to sign a lucrative deal with the Red Sox in favor of a four-year, $52 million deal with the Yankees.

When that contract elapsed and he remained unsigned, he signed a one-year, $8 million deal with the Tigers, who are out of the playoff chase, flirting with the .500 mark.

His return to Boston would be a big hit with ex-teammates, that’s for sure.

Asked if he’d want Damon back, David Ortiz said, “Oh, definitely. Let’s wait and see what happens. That’d be great, man. You know Johnny. Johnny’s a great person to be around. And I’m pretty sure he’d be excited to be back and for all the people that did him wrong put it back together and make him forget about the Yankees thing.”

“Johnny’s great in the clubhouse and he’s a gamer on the field and he’s one hell of a teammate,” said Jason Varitek. “It’d be a nice opportunity. Being a great player, he makes athletic adjustments offensively. He’s an example when he plays. He plays hurt. He’s not always 100 percent. And so much is how he plays the game. He plays the game right. It pushes energy. And he’s definitely an exciting player.”

The more Damon thought about the possibility Monday, the more he seemed OK with it. “If, somehow, we (Red Sox) pulled it together and made the playoffs, that could mean a lot to people,” he said.

Out of the hospital

Jarrod Saltalamacchia was back in the clubhouse Monday after his weekend stay in the hospital due to an infection of his right leg.

“They said the only way they’d be able to find out what it is or where I got it is if I had surgery,” he said. “Luckily, the antibiotics worked so I didn’t have to do that. They don’t know really what to call it.

“I was warming up the pitcher, ran to the bullpen, my ankle was sore, I was kind of limping a little bit. I didn’t know what it was and then I kind of went inside and I was gonna go ice it. I took my shoes off and everything and it was just swollen. No way to explain it. a big red mark so they kind of circled it to see if it grew and the next day it got bigger and it kept getting bigger and bigger. They don’t know how it started.”

After a couple of days to relax, Saltalamacchia will join Pawtucket in Rochester over the weekend.

He was one of five catchers in the Sox clubhouse during the day, along with Victor Martinez, Jason Varitek, Kevin Cash and Dusty Brown, who was optioned after the game.

Around the bases

Hideki Okajima started the seventh inning, allowing four runs on four hits for Pawtucket at Buffalo. He threw 16 pitches, 13 strikes … Eric Patterson will join Saltalamacchia at Rochester … Mike Cameron’s ab surgery will be performed in Boston by Dr. David Berger, assisted by team physician Tom Gill. No date has been set … The Sox sent pictures of Dustin Pedroia’s healing left foot to Dr. Robert Anderson, the physician who consulted on Varitek’s foot recovery, in North Carolina … Rookie Junichi Tazawa, whose season was derailed by Tommy John surgery, will travel from Fort Myers, Fla., to Boston for checkup in September. “Fort Myers in August – that’ll teach him never to get hurt again,” said manager Terry Francona … Francona said that while Michael Bowden and Felix Doubront could be stretched out for an emergency start in case of further bad weather, he’s not inclined to start Doubront because his left arm is valuable out of the pen. Francona cited Tim Wakefield as a possible fill-in starter … Of the 17 hits in this game, none went for extra bases … Ryan Kalish had his second outfield assist of the season … Mike Lowell’s seventh-inning single was his 1,600th career hit.

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